Playtested by Poker Flat, Felix, Hephalistofene (The Author) and Maurice

Settings: Normal

Tested version 0.95 (0.93 available for public download )
Updated: Final Version is out now.

Every of the five maps is unique. They look and feel connected though.

Map 1 starts outside the complex. You have to cross a deadly minefield, cross a broken bridge, activate a timecode and fight the swarm while waiting for the door to open. Then you have to break a door before you get crushed by the wall!

Map 2 Inside the sewers you have to face monsters (!), close or open doors. Avoid beeing crused! During the boss-battle you can listen to music from Distance to Here.

Map 3 Several hacks, lot's of swarms and a deadly holdout. Keep your welder at hand!

Map 4 Omg, trapped in a maze! Get out of the vents, activate the right sequenze to start the T75 charge.... then run like hell!

Map 5 Just detonate the warhead..... o.O but the way is blocked. Clear the path and descend the nuke right into the heart of the swarm. Then get the hell out... The dropship is ready to bring you home.

Pray it won't crash on a prison planet where everyone but you dies during the crash..... But that's a different story

Overall:
Valve should make this campaign public! It's the best addon campaign so far. And final means in this case realy complete and bugfree.

Nearly bugfree (errors not aliens!) campaign.
The first map has some issues with the camera when you stand to close to a southwall. Then you cant see your char nor the aliens.
The elevator on the last map is a bit glitched (it stotttttttters) but working.

Some maps are a conversion from Half Life 2.
The first three maps are nice, chalanging but not realy tough.
fourth map needs more effort.
We did not restart a single time since then.
Last map is tough and we had to restart a few times and needed to talk about strat and char setup.

I dont want to spoil the first time experience when playing the last map. But I think it will be obvious why it's harder then the four other maps.

Short but chalanging map We did not encounter any gamebreaking or optical bugs. It has everything you would expect from a good Alien Swarm map:

-Minimap is working, good mission briefing
-"Tunnel"-run through a pitch black canyon while bugs and bugfire attack you. Oh, and mind your step!
-Little holdout to hack-open the base main entrance
-Normal amounts of aliens contantly attacking while progressing through the compound
-Amazing looking, even though it's a small, infested Generator room. Tough holdout during hack
-Some optional rooms that makes the base more believeable and offer resupplies needed when playing with less ammo.
-Great suprise before the exit!

Overall: Realy fun to play, no gamebreaking bugs. Very good balanced. It was always chalanging, though, never felt unfair.

This in advance, those are the best addon maps I have played so far.
The maps are big. Bigger then any map from Jacobs Rest.
They take longer and make you split up your team, though it is not necessary.
To explain the differences between this (unfinished) addon campaign with the official campaign would be like comparing sigma campaign (from the ut2k4 mod) with telic (dont get me wrong, those maps are not half as detailed, complex and complicated as the telic maps):
-Not 100% liniar
-You get encouraged to split up for exterminating eggs, use a turret from a room on a different level to cover your hacker in the hall below.
-You get encouraged to seal the doors behind you while you progress

There are realy much drones on the map. Even on normal (with two players) you dont have the feeling that you would like to turn on the onslaught mode. Though, it does not feel unfair at all. You just have to seal whenever possible, use your flamer economically and be on the move.
And yea, you want to leave this building as fast as possible!
The maps allow you to recreate at a few save spots, which is nice since the maps are big. Felix: "I'll get some food!, Westy: "Okay!".
The compound looks believeable and just good.
Compared to City 17, one thumb, this one get's three thumbs from me!

Overall: Realy fun to play, no gamebreaking bugs, looks great, yet unfinished campaign, though, since the episodes are connected you can play them in row. Best addon maps I have played so far.

Could be worth to be included as official campaign when it has been finished.

Each of the three maps offer a totaly different game experience. Though, they feel connected while the "storry" progresses.

First map is on the red planets surface. Bugs crawl out of the send or climp up the cliffs. After finding the beacon you have to enter a big tunnel system that leads to a big cave where you have to face a realy massive spawn. Which tunnel leads to the cave is random for every game.
After the tunnels you reach the human facility. Before entering you have to stand a classic holdout.

Second map is inside the compound. This map is more chalanging and looks also realy good and complete. There are a few suprises waiting for the marines! After a few failures we descided that we have to change our strategy and splitt up into two teams to minimize the needed time between button pressing. We half-deployed a sentry to cover our run to the exit. Then both teams reunited, pressed the last button, run back to the sentry to set it up and run to the exit. Overall, a realy great map. Better then any other map, including the officials, I have played so far.

Third map is a bit of a disappointment, compared to the maps before. I hope this is due to it's early stage. The look of it is less cool and it was never realy chalanging. One cool moment (suprise!) at the end, though.

The author wrote that there might be 7-9 (!) more maps comming up.
Therefore this is called "Chapter 1: Insertion"

Overall: Realy fun to play, no gamebreaking bugs. I give this one three thumbs. I had as much fun playing this as I had playing the paranoia campaign maps. However, I can not realy descide which I like more. It is not realy possible to compare the maps, since the look and feel, as well as the spawns, are so completely different.

Could be worth to be included as official campaign when it has been finished.

The first map looks good, plays good, but is way to small. Regarding the storyline it fits well into the campaign. However, it is not more then a little warmup.

Second map is much better: Good balanced spawns. Be adviced to weld doors behind you! It's the classic "Kill all the eggs, do the hack" mission. The holdout during hack at the end is okay. You flee with a ridiculous "spacecraft" :-) Still a good idea, cause it is a fair transfer, regarding storyline, to the next map.

Third map is from the same quality and bigger. It feels like one of the classic ortega missions and fun. The design is very nice. Little flaw in logic when you download data at then end right before you go into cryo, but okay, that is not gamebreaking. Keep in mind it is an early alpha version.
I think they meant "alter the course of the ship to the swarms homeplanet" then go to cryo.

Looking forward for the next two maps.

Overall:
All maps are great regarding look and feel. 1st is to small, 2nd and 3rd map are fun to play and chalanging on higher settings.

Episode 1 (v 1.1) offers unique requirements: Teamwork. One team has to open doors and defend the hacker with a remote turret. Sealing doors is essential. First view of the mission map might be a bit disturbing. Though, it is realy worth playing.
Can be played with two players on normal (yea, it's chalanging) and becomes much harder on higher settings.

Overall:
Episode 1 is a great map with unqiue features. Complete campaign might be worth beeing made official.

4X

Last edited by Felix; 16th Nov 2010 at 05:36 AM.
Reason: Lana's Escape final version since yesterday

Thanks for the heads up Felix. I need a reliable source of information when it comes to downloading custom campaigns as every bill, bob and jim has made something to add to the pile of unplayable junk out there.

Paranoia:
Did the first two episodes last night with some friends. Good stuff!

Swarm Armory's download for Ep3 appears to be having issues, but it's mirrored on FPSBanana, thankfully.

Some notes; door sealing is vital, but those doors won't hold for long in many cases. Keep moving and always watch your back. Flares/flashlight are actually kinda useful in a couple of places, though it's never really pitch black apart from one area for a few seconds.

Objectives and the HUD seem to be a bit broken but it's otherwise pretty playable, and the zones mark things out neatly enough.

They didn't seem that long or big (maybe about the size of Timor Station, tops?) and we certainly didn't feel forced to split our team up at any given point.

I like it as much as I like the other two maps. Though, it is a very different map style. Much bigger then the other two maps. The author inherited the TF2 idea of "goldrush" where you have to push a cart forward while the enemy tries to "disturb" you.

Yes, we have played through Lana's Escape. It was fun already but it's an early beta, so it would not be fair to write a review now.

Also I read in the steam forum thread that there was an update taking care of lot's of issues (we encountered too).

If you like we could schedule a game for friday night. How about 22:00 GMT+1 (German timezone)? Don't beat me up if I dont show up on schedule (or at all), cause I can't actually schedule Julias bedtime :-). However, I give you a 90% chance.